Two Easy Kitchen Recycling Tips

This foil still has at least two good uses out of it.Photo: Copyright iStockphoto.com / KevinDyer

Now that I have a child at college, I worry that I am becoming That Mom. You know, the one who sends completely useless newspaper clippings to her children, friends them on Facebook, and hoards old yogurt cups and rubber bands and bits of string because you never know when they might come in handy. But I proudly stand by two habits that I inherited from my mother, both of which make my daughters cringe: I wash and reuse the big, storage-size Ziploc plastic bags until they fall apart and I reuse and then recycle aluminum foil. The reason a lot of people don’t do this is because there’s really no cost advantage. Go to Sam’s Club, Target, or Costco for your foil and plastic bags and you won’t spend a lot of money. But I do this for the same reason my mother does: I just cannot bear to add more junk to our already overloaded landfills. And I particularly don’t want to add more usable junk to those landfills.

I use Ziploc bags to store baguettes and bagels that I buy at my local Fairway market, since I can’t get there every day. Those bread products are not contaminated with E. coli, as far as I am aware. If I store meat in the bags, I wrap it first in butchers paper or foil, then put it in the plastic bag and label it. After I’ve used the bags, I wash them in warm soapy water, rinse them carefully in hot water, and allow them to air dry. Of course, I could also use non-plastic bag alternatives, but as green as I like to think I am, I’m not that green.

As for foil, I mainly use that to tent meat as it rests after roasting. It gets pretty greasy, so I just wipe it off, fold it up, and add it to the recycling. It’s amazing how many people aren’t aware that you can–and should–recycle foil. And if it isn’t greasy or messy, simply smooth it out, fold it up, and put it back in the drawer until the next time you need a piece of foil.